The Parent's View with Ben Kornfeld

Introducing our new series "The Parent's View," we check in with parents to discuss what to expect from the summer, and what reflections they have. Writing for us this month is Ben Kornfeld, whose daughter went to camp for the first time last summer!Here is what Ben had to say:Last summer was our first year with a Beber Camp camper and to say it exceeded our expectations is an understatement. Having had such a lengthy lead-in from deciding that overnight camp was the right choice for our daughter to when that vision was actualized due to the summer 2020 pandemic pause, we were concerned that the idea of camp may have been so overly built-up in her mind that it could not have possibly delivered. It turned out that all that pent-up anticipation translated into a kid who was 100% all-in from start to finish. Packing her up was part of the adventure - we made decisions as a group about what clothing items to bring and made sure she considered that anything she took to camp there was a chance she may not come home with for any number of reasons. We even made a well-researched online purchase for a low-tech non-video camp-sanctioned MP3 player that we learned after camp was over was something she treasured having available (it was what she turned to those rare moments when she missed us). Dropping her off at camp had its fair share of tears but they were our own after seeing our brave kid hop out of the van and confidently join a group of peers she would in two short weeks go on to consider some of her best friends. The post-2021 camp and pre-2022 camp interlude has been full of phone calls with out-of-state friends and in-town playdates with her B-F-F with whom she has built an unbreakable bond based on shared experiences from camp. We have come a long way in a short time, going from cautious parents at first to accept that there was a lot we didn’t know about what camp would be like for her to listening to her ideas about what her life will be like when she is old enough to be a counselor at Beber Camp!